General Mobile Radio Service (GMRS) Emergency Channel

[WSGM532]

Can anyone explain how to use The GMRS Emergency channel?  Is is similar to CB 9 or Marine 16? 

[OffRoaderX]

13 minutes ago, WSGM532 said:

Can anyone explain how to use The GMRS Emergency channel?

no, because it does not exist..

Contrary to "some people's", wishes, hopes and dreams, there is no generally accepted or FCC-designated emergency channel for GMRS. There may have been one, long, long ago, but not anymore. "Some people" claiming otherwise should be ignored, laughed at, and called names.

[Haroldo]

There is a "Travel" channel that seems to have ears listening on "Channel 20" 462.6750 many times.

You can use the simplex channel 20, or the repeater equivalent, with a tone of 141.3 and possibly make contact.

 

[OffRoaderX]

25 minutes ago, Haroldo said:

There is a "Travel" channel that seems to have ears listening on "Channel 20" 462.6750 many times.

You can use the simplex channel 20, or the repeater equivalent, with a tone of 141.3 and possibly make contact.

This is, in no way, related to, or even similar to an "emergency channel" as asked about by the OP.   This advice should be ignored as it relates to a GMRS "Emergency Channel", unless your plan in a serious emergency is to die alone.

[dosw]

2 hours ago, Haroldo said:

There is a "Travel" channel that seems to have ears listening on "Channel 20" 462.6750 many times.

You can use the simplex channel 20, or the repeater equivalent, with a tone of 141.3 and possibly make contact.

 

No, there WAS a travel channel 30 years ago. There is no travel channel today. 

[WRYZ926]

As mentioned, there is no emergency or travel channel on GMRS.

Your best bet is to look for GMRS repeaters where you plan to travel and program them into your radio. You can also transmit on the repeater output frequency/channel on simplex and others will still hear you if you have tones set correctly (if the repeater used them). Most open repeaters will use a tone of 141.3 

PS: for those with CB's, Channel 9 is pretty much useless most of the time. I have heard stations in Puerto RIco and other countries running high powered amps on Channel 9. The one from Puerto Rico sounds like he is just down the street from me here in Missouri.

[SteveShannon]

While there is no official national emergency channel for GMRS, some areas have announced that they monitor a particular GMRS channel.  An example is the state of Wyoming.  The state has this webpage instructing people to use channel 3 with privacy code 7.  The state has the area code 307.

https://hls.wyo.gov/307
 

So, before you travel, do some research to see if there’s a local effort to monitor a channel.  But if you really need reliable emergency communications, consider one of the emergency satellite communications devices.

[nokones]

14 hours ago, dosw said:

No, there WAS a travel channel 30 years ago. There is no travel channel today. 

No there wasn't any designated travel channel 30 years ago. 

About 30+ years ago, there was a designated emergency channel and that was the 467.675/462.675 MHz channel pair with 141.3 CTCSS.  On the license in those days, it stated that channel, which is Channel 20 these days, was reserved for emergencies operations.  REACT was allowed to use it for relaying emergency information amongst their monitoring stations.

According to my old GMRS license, effective 2-16-1999, GMRS licensees may operate on 462.675/467.675 MHz channel pair at any time and that channel pair was no longer restricted for emergencies.

After the FCC changed the rule, several REACT organizations and GMRS Radio Clubs adopted the Ch. 20 as a nationwide Travel Channel with 141.3 Hz CTCSS, but there was never a rule whereas it was never a FCC mandate.  It was widely ignored by most users and never took hold as nationwide travel channel.

[WQAI363]

On 1/28/2025 at 10:55 PM, WSGM532 said:

Can anyone explain how to use The GMRS Emergency channel?  Is is similar to CB 9 or Marine 16? 

Listen to OffRoaderX! OffRoaderX usually knows the ins and outs of GMRS and if he says that there isn't an official emergency channel, well he should know. Of course, there's the CH-3 Project sponsored by AMRRON.  In my opinion, that's the closes thing to having an official Emergency channel is, to fellow along with AMRRON.  I'm sure there's folks out there who would disagree with me about that, but everyone has that right.  Then again, GMRS isn't like CB or MARINE. Even with Amateur Radio there really isn't any official designated frequencies set aside for Emergency use.

 

 

[SvenMarbles]

There are no such channel designations on GMRS because GMRS wasn’t meant to be a radio band to get on and reach out to random people. 

[WRYS709]

1 hour ago, SvenMarbles said:

There are no such channel designations on GMRS because GMRS wasn’t meant to be a radio band to get on and reach out to random people. 

Wait: you're saying that non-random people do not have emergencies?!?

[SteveShannon]

1 hour ago, WRYS709 said:

Wait: you're saying that non-random people do not have emergencies?!?

That must mean I’m a random person

[WRTC928]

3 hours ago, SvenMarbles said:

There are no such channel designations on GMRS because GMRS wasn’t meant to be a radio band to get on and reach out to random people. 

That doesn't mean it wouldn't be useful. 

[RIPPER238]

GMRS Emergency channel = Any channel that answers the call. 

[SteveShannon]

37 minutes ago, WRTC928 said:

That doesn't mean it wouldn't be useful. 

I don’t believe it would be useful.  In fact I think it would be a drain on emergency services and do more harm by creating a false sense of security.
How would it work?  Strictly a voluntary simplex/peer to peer effort or something officially established?
How would it interface with public services: 911, police, fire?

How would it be monitored? Remember, GMRS regulations have no government agency licensing.  All licensees are individuals, so every person who might have to communicate with the GMRS radio would need their own license.  For public service employees that would also mean an additional radio to be carried.
Given finite tax dollars, which other emergency services would receive less so GMRS users would have their own emergency channel?

That’s not to say that having GMRS might not be be helpful in an emergency as a last resort.  I just think it’s foolish to rely on it when planning a risky endeavor, unless you create your own response system.

[WRTC928]

5 hours ago, SteveShannon said:

I don’t believe it would be useful.  In fact I think it would be a drain on emergency services and do more harm by creating a false sense of security.
How would it work?  Strictly a voluntary simplex/peer to peer effort or something officially established?
How would it interface with public services: 911, police, fire?

How would it be monitored? Remember, GMRS regulations have no government agency licensing.  All licensees are individuals, so every person who might have to communicate with the GMRS radio would need their own license.  For public service employees that would also mean an additional radio to be carried.
Given finite tax dollars, which other emergency services would receive less so GMRS users would have their own emergency channel?

That’s not to say that having GMRS might not be be helpful in an emergency as a last resort.  I just think it’s foolish to rely on it when planning a risky endeavor, unless you create your own response system.

All valid points. I was actually thinking of an agreed-upon channel to be used to call for help, not necessarily monitored by emergency services, but that would suffer from the fact that nobody would be monitoring. I don't know if most GMRS users routinely scan or just pick a channel and stay with it. 

[OffRoaderX]

1 minute ago, WRTC928 said:

I don't know if most GMRS users routinely scan or just pick a channel and stay with it. 

Whenever we are out off-roading I scan all channels - but because of the terrain/geography of the Southern California deserts, the range is usually limited to only a few miles.
One time we were in the desert near Barstow and was able to talk with a group off-roading in Death Valley, about 85 miles away - but even in that case, we would not have been much help because they were TOO far...

[WRYZ926]

20 minutes ago, OffRoaderX said:

Whenever we are out off-roading I scan all channels - but because of the terrain/geography of the Southern California deserts, the range is usually limited to only a few miles.
One time we were in the desert near Barstow and was able to talk with a group off-roading in Death Valley, about 85 miles away - but even in that case, we would not have been much help because they were TOO far...

You hit the valleys just right to pick up people in Death Valley from Barstow. And I agree you would not have been much help to them being 85 miles away.

We had problems getting through from north post of Ft Irwin to main base without the use of repeaters due to the Granite Mountains.

For those that don't know. Ft Irwin is 45 miles north of Barstow. And that is only to main base and not including the north part where all of the live fire ranges are. The Northeast corner of Ft Irwin butts up to the southwest corner of Death Valley National Park.

Range will be limited in the Mohave due to the terrain while you can definitely get farther range in the Sonoran since it is more flat (in spots).

[OffRoaderX]

2 minutes ago, WRYZ926 said:

For those that don't know. Ft Irwin is 45 miles north of Barstow

We were actually standing at the Ft. Irwin fence along the southwestern edges, reading the "you better not go past this point" signs when we were hearing the guys in Death Valley.

[WRYZ926]

Ft Irwin has been expanded quite a bit since I left in 1996. Either way, that was a good haul to hear people in Death Valley.

[SteveShannon]

38 minutes ago, WRTC928 said:

All valid points. I was actually thinking of an agreed-upon channel to be used to call for help, not necessarily monitored by emergency services, but that would suffer from the fact that nobody would be monitoring. I don't know if most GMRS users routinely scan or just pick a channel and stay with it. 

Our rocket club all uses 7-6 (channel 7, tone 6) on our Garmin radios. We’re miles away from the nearest town. We basically bring our own support group. 
We mostly use the radios to guide people towards where we saw their rocket descend. If someone had a medical emergency (a fall or heat exhaustion) they could let us know, so in that sense it’s useful, but only because we have a group of people monitoring the shared channel.

Our most likely emergency is a grass fire. For that we have used cell phones to summon help. 

[BoxCar]

There a too few channels available on GMRS/FRS radios to attempt setting one aside for emergency calling. Setting CB channel 9 aside worked, after a fashion, but too many people just see it as another channel to use. The major problem with GMRS/FRS are the privacy codes. Not all radios come with no codes set and not all users no how to set or clear codes. This wasn't an issue with CB as that service didn't have CTCSS available.

[WRYZ926]

CB channel 9 can be useless now days when you have people running high power amps on that channel. I hear it all of the time. There is one guy from Puerto Rico that is always blasting away on channel 9, he sounds lie he is sitting next to me.

[WRTC928]

17 hours ago, SteveShannon said:

Our most likely emergency is a grass fire. For that we have used cell phones to summon help. 

I recently moved back to Oklahoma after 18 years in Alaska. I sometimes still think in terms of large areas where cell phone service isn't available. There probably aren't too many of those in the lower 48. Not coincidentally, there are a surprising number of GMRS and amateur radio repeaters in Alaska for a state with such a small population. 

[SteveShannon]

14 minutes ago, WRTC928 said:

I recently moved back to Oklahoma after 18 years in Alaska. I sometimes still think in terms of large areas where cell phone service isn't available. There probably aren't too many of those in the lower 48. Not coincidentally, there are a surprising number of GMRS and amateur radio repeaters in Alaska for a state with such a small population. 

I think it depends on population. We have lots of mountainous areas in Montana (fourth largest in area, with only a million people) with no cellular service. I suspect Nevada, Wyoming, Idaho, and even parts of eastern California, once you get away from the interstates and population centers, have significant areas with limited access. 

We have 158 amateur repeaters in Montana and only 8 GMRS repeaters.

Alaska is much larger but according to RepeaterBook has 6 GMRS repeaters and 114 amateur repeaters. I don’t know how accurate that is but obviously neither state has sufficient coverage for emergency purposes.

I don’t believe repeaterbook is as complete for GMRS repeaters as MyGMRS.com.